Myron Eells

“ This delay was the source of much uneasiness to the Indians, more, I think, than any other cause, for men were not wanting who told them that they would be moved away; there were plenty of people who coveted their land, and examples were not wanting of Indians who had been moved from place to place by the government. It has been the only thing which has ever caused them to talk about war. Some Indians left the reservation because they feared they would be moved away. “I am not going to clear land and fence it for the whites to use,” was what one said and others felt. ”

“ The Indian doctor does not like to have his business interfered with by any one. It is a source of money and influence to him, and he often uses his influence, which is great among the Indians, to prevent the use of medical remedies. (3) If a medicine given by the physician does not cure in a few doses, or, at least, in two or three days, they think it is not strong, or it is good for nothing—so often when medicine is given, with directions how to use it, it is left untouched or thrown away. ”

“ TOBACCO. THE use of tobacco is not as excessive among the Twanas as among many Indians—not as much so as among the Clallams. Seldom is one seen smoking or chewing, though a large share of the Indians use it a little. Yet not much of a direct war has been waged against it. There have been so many greater evils against which it seemed necessary to contend that I hardly thought it wise to speak much in public against it. Still a quiet influence has been exerted against it. The agent never uses it, and very few of the employees have done so. ”

“ If the Indian in time is to become an American citizen,—and that is the goal to be reached,—he must speak the English language, and it is best to teach it to him while young. In large tribes like the Sioux, where the children will speak their native language almost wholly after they leave school, and where there are enough of them to make it pay to publish books and papers in their own tongue, it is probably best to have the schools in their native language, as a transition from one language to the other. ”

“ The civilization and Christianity of the United States, with all that is uncivilized and un-Christian, is not yet ready to kill them. One writer has proposed to move them to some good country which Americans do not want, and leave it to them. We have been trying to find such a place for a century—have moved the Indians from one reservation to another and from one State or Territory to another ”

“ At a council held after a time by various tribes, the Skokomish and other neighboring tribes of the lower eastern sound were too strong for the Twanas and induced Father Chirouse to leave them. Not long afterward the Indians relapsed into their old style of religion, and on the surface it appeared as if all were forgotten: but when Protestant teachers came among them, and their old religion died, some of the Indians turned for a time to that Catholic religion which they had first learned, as one easier for the natural heart to follow than that of the Protestants. ”

“ Still in a few years he made it very unsafe for most permanent residents to sell intoxicating liquors to the Indians, so that but few except transient people, as sailors and travelers, dared to do so.
“For ways that are dark and tricks that are vain” the Indian and the liquor-seller can almost rival the “heathen Chinee.” A saloon is on the beach, and so high that it is easy to go under it. A small hole is in the floor under the counter.{63} A hand comes up with some money in it: after dark a bottle goes down, and some Indians are drunk, but nobody can prove any thing wrong. ”

“ Chehalis Jack is one of the most intelligent and civilized of the older uneducated Twana Indians. He has been one of those most ready to adopt the customs and beliefs of the whites; has stood by the agent and missionary in their efforts to civilize and Christianize his people when very few other Indians have done so, and was one of the first of the older Indians to unite with the church. He was a sub-chief, and tried to induce his people to adopt civilized customs, setting them an example in building by far the best house erected by the Indians on the reservation, and in various other ways. ”

“ Under the head of native religion, two cases have been given, where it seemed to the Indians as if their mode was true. This has occasionally been the effect with older people. But with young children, too young to go to school, the opposite has been true. Infants have continually died. Their mortality has been very great, when they lived at home, where they could have all the Indian doctors they wanted with no one to interfere. The medicine-men have been especially unfortunate in losing their own children. One Indian doctor has buried twelve and has only three left. ”

“ Therefore the Indians are with us to remain. They are to be our neighbors. The remaining question is, Shall they be good or bad ones? If{12} we are willing that they shall be bad, all that is necessary is for good people to neglect them; for were there no evil influences connected with civilization (!) , they would not rise from their degradation, ignorance, and wickedness without help. When, however, we add to their native heathenism all the vices of intemperance, immorality, hate, and the like, which wicked men naturally carry to them, they will easily and quickly become very bad neighbors. ”

“ It was, in years past, the residence of one of the most influential bands of the Clallam tribe, but they are diminishing, partly from the fact that there have been but few white families among them from whom they could obtain work, and, with a few exceptions, they themselves have done but little about cultivating the soil. As they could easily go across the straits to Victoria in British Columbia, about twenty miles distant, where there is little restraint in regard to their procuring whiskey, because they are American Indians, they have been steadily losing influence and numbers. ”

“ On reaching Jamestown, the afternoon was spent in introducing an Indian from British Columbia, who had taken me there in his canoe, to the Clallam Indians and the school; and in comforting two parents, Christian Indians, whose youngest child lay at the point of death. The next day she died, and, as no minister had ever been among these Indians at any previous funeral, they needed some instruction. So it was my duty to assist in digging the grave and making the coffin, comfort them, and attend the funeral in a snow-storm. ”

“ PRELIMINARY HISTORY. EVER since the Spanish traders and Vancouver in the latter part of the last century, and the Northwest Fur Company and Hudson’s Bay Company in the early part of the present century, came to Puget Sound, these Indians have had some intercourse with the whites, and learned some things about the white man’s ways, his Sabbath, his Bible, and his God. Fort Nisqually, one of the posts of the Hudson’s Bay Company, was situated about fifty miles from Skokomish, so that these Indians were comparatively near to it. ”

“ When the church was organized at Jamestown in 1882, he was unanimously elected as deacon, and he has ever since filled that position.
Once, five or six years ago, when in Seattle, he was asked by a Catholic Indian of his own tribe, belonging to Port Gamble, to drink some whiskey, but he declined. When urged time and again to do so he still refused, giving as his excuse that he belonged to the church. “So do I,” said his tempter “but we drink, and then we can easily get the priest to pardon us by paying him a little money.” “That is not the way we do in our church,” said Billy. ”

“ There is much of human nature in them. In many respects—as in their habits of neatness and industry, their visions, superstitions, and the like—I have often been reminded of what I have read about ignorant whites in the Southern and Western States fifty years ago, and of what I have seen among the same class of people in Oregon thirty years ago.{271}
Soon after I came here, an old missionary said to me: “Keep on with the work; the fruits of Christian labor among the Indians have been as great or greater than among the whites.” ”

“ It is the only part of tamahnous, which I think an Indian can hold and be a Christian, because it is held partly as a superstition and not wholly as a religion. Some white, ignorant persons are superstitious and, at the same time, are Christians. The bad spirit which causes the sickness is called a bad tamahnous. Soon after I first came here, we spent several evenings in discussing the qualifications of church membership, the main difference of opinion centering on this subject of tamahnous over the sick. ”

“ The largest share of good timber on the reservation has been taken off during the past twenty years, so that now a number have bought timber off the reservation for logging. They own their own teams, keep their own time-books, and at present attend to all their own business in connection with these camps. In one respect they differ from white folks—in their mode of conducting the business. Instead of one or two men owning every thing, hiring the men, paying all expenses, and taking all the profits, they combine together and unitedly share the profits or losses. ”

“ The obtaining of dog-fish oil is something of a business, as logging-camps use a large amount of it. In September there is employment at the Puyallup and surrounding region, about ninety miles from Skokomish, in picking hops. Hop-raising has grown to be a large business among the whites, and Indians have been preferred for picking the hops, thousands of whom flock there every year for the purpose, from every part of the Sound, and even from British Columbia and the Yakama country. Old people, women, and children do as well at this as able-bodied men. ”

“ Wherever there is whiskey a bad influence goes forth, and there is whiskey not far from nearly all the Indian settlements. Still it must be acknowledged that the influence of all classes of whites has been in favor of industry, Christian services at funerals, and the like, and against tamahnous and potlatches. Around Skokomish—with a few exceptions of those whose influence has been very good—there are not many who keep the Sabbath and do not swear, drink whiskey, and gamble; but this influence has been partially counteracted by the employees on the reservation. ”

“ Only once have I ever felt that there was much danger in traveling in a canoe. I was coming from Clallam Bay to Jamestown in November, 1883, with five Indians. We left Port Angeles on the afternoon of the last day with a good wind, but when we had been out a short time and it was almost dark, a low, black snow-squall struck us. There was no safe place to land, and we went along safely until we reached the Dunginess Spit, which is six miles long. ”

“ When some of the Alaska Indians, coveting the prosperity which the Christian Indians of that region had acquired, asked one of these Christians what they must do in order to become Christians, the reply was: “First give up your potlatches.” It was felt that there was so much evil connected with them that they and Christianity could not flourish together. Among the Twanas, while they are not dead, they are largely on the wane. ”

“ When hymns were first made in the Chinook jargon there were so many whites to sing in church, that the Indians did not seem to take hold. They would sing well enough at their camps, the boys would sing loud enough when alone at the boarding-house or outdoors, but when they came to church they were almost mum. The whites and the school-girls did most of it. ”

“ That the better class of Indians should not go to the races, and that all should earnestly contend against going to that place for fear of temptation; that they asked for a white man to guard them; that an Indian told a white man not to give liquor to his fellow-Indians, and that, while most of the white men drank some, it was not known that any Indian drank at all, although it was not the better class of Indians who were present, were facts which were encouraging. ”

“ LANGUAGES. ONE great difficulty in the missionary work is the number of languages used by the people. The Clallams have one, the Twanas another; about one sixth of the people on the reservation had originally come from Squaxin, and spoke the Nisqually; the Chinook jargon is an inter-tribal language, which is spoken by nearly all the Indians, except the very old and very young, as far south as Northern California, north into Alaska, west to the Pacific Ocean, and east to Western Idaho. ”

“ SPICE. AN experience which is not very pleasant comes from the vermin, especially the fleas—not a refined word; but the most refined society gets accustomed to it here because they have to do so, and the more so the nearer they get to the native land of these animals—the Indians. ”

“ After having been a year on probation, he was received into the church in July, 1878, when he was thirteen or fourteen years old. He did fairly until he left the reservation, three or four years afterward, when he went to a white logging-camp where his brother and brother-in-law were at work. Logging-camps are not{198} noted for their morals, and their influence on a young man can not be good in this respect. He remained steadier than most whites around him, and his instruction is not lost, but his Christian life is sadly dwarfed, if it can be seen at all. ”